CP-A family perspective(7/23-24) very long

Kick The Sky

Monday, July 29, 2002 9:43 AM

Decided to make my now yearly(this is only the second year) trip to the Po!nt with some extra people this year. We decided on taking three of my nieces along. The girls; Sarah age 10, Marisa age 13, and Catherine age 15; go with us every year to Great America so taking them to amusement parks isnt exactly a foriegn concept for us.

One other thing made this different from any other coaster trip we had taken. The Sunday before we left, my wife sprains her ankle at Festa Italiana(one of the many ethnic festivals that are held yearly in Milwaukee) and she requires crutches. Make that a wheelchair at the parks.

I decided that instead of writing a standard enthusiast trip report, I would mix in the comments of what people around here like to refer to as the GP, or as I like to refer to them as Sarah, Marisa, and Catherine. Sarah isnt much for the whole coaster thing yet. We had to give her Dramamine so she wouldnt get sick on the 8 hour drive to Ohio. Catherine braved Raging Bull for the first time last year so my expectations were high with her and Marisa is just getting into the big coasters.

Monday we spent driving to Sandusky. My wife and I made the executive decision to stay outside of Sandusky this year and opt in for Norwalk since every business establishment besides Cedar Point in Sandusky had HORRIBLE service. Well, you think Sandusky is bad, Norwalk is worse. We stayed at the Amerihost in Norwalk and it was the single worst hotel that we ever stayed at. No extra pillows. No extra towels. One day, no towels at all. The front desk was run by a complete and total stoner. We spoke to the manager on Wedensday and she gave us a whole 10% off of our bill for our troubles. My wife and I both agreed that next year we would just spend the extra cash and stay at Breakers Express and get the good service.

So Monday night we drive out to the Po!nt just to see the coasters from the road and the girls absolutely freak when they see Millenium Force. The oldest one which was looking so forward to this ride flatly stated, "There is no way in hell I am gonna ride that!"

The next morning dawns and after getting the entire crew together for the day and finally get to the park at 11am. I park in the Soak City lot only to remember that my wife needed a wheelchair. Well, I decided to take a gamble that there are some at this gate too. The people at the ticket booth say that I can get one from the Joe Cool store. Wrong. They are already out at 11am. I end up having to walk to the front of the park to get one and walk all the way back to the Joe Cool store with the wheel chair to get my wife.

The girls are antsy to get going so off to the first coaster of the day, Magnum. The two older girls both agreed to go on this one and we stepped into the 45 minute line while my wife and the youngest girl go off to Camp Snoopy to power ride the tilt-a-whirl. Being the airtime whore that I am I decide to heed everyone's advice and ride this in 1.3 while the girls opt for a seat a few rows back. I was very underwhelmed the last visit with this coaster but this trip changed my opinion of this coaster. I was getting violent airtime all the way back to the station from the pretzel turns. Catherine loved the drop but thought the ride was too rough. Marisa hated the drop and closed her eyes for most of the ride and refused to ride it again for the rest of the trip.

We hit various flat rides on the way to Corkscrew. The girls all loved the Troika and we ended up returning to this ride quite frequently during our trip. Marisa and Catherine rode the Corkscrew with me and the they both commented how much better the staff was at running rides at this park than at Great America. They liked the extra hustle they put in and the fact that they made their best effort to send out full trains with no empty seats. They also liked that most coasters did not have a recorded ride announcement and that the ride ops made the ride more personal with their humorous sayings.

Marisa and Catherine both gave Corkscrew thumbs down and declared it worse than the Demon as far as being rough. I could not for the life of me get comfortable in that car. The only excitement for me was being upside down over the midway.

Next up was Iron Dragon and this was going to be Sarah's first big coaster. We all took turns riding it, leaving someone behind with the wheelchair. My wife and the girls loved this ride. They all put this coaster as one of their favorites of the trip. This is coming from riders who have been on Maggie and Raging Bull. I personally thought it was one long yawn fest but I was happy to make the girls happy so it all balanced out.

We decided to head down the main midway and hit all the rides down there and first up was Cedar Downs. Again, we all switched off on this so we all got about three rides a piece on it. The girls got an enormous kick out of this ride and it was instantly the favorite non-coaster ride for all of us. I had fun on this ride last year, but with a full row of people, this ride is even more fun. For those that havent been on this ride, it is one of two left in the world. It is a carousel that has no middle, where the horses race each other, and it is faster than any other carousel you have ever been on.

Next up was the Calypso and Blue Streak. Catherine and I did Blue Streak while the rest of the girls did the Calypso. The Calypso is like a Scrambler on crack. It is tilted on it's side and runs faster than the original. The Calypso type ride at Great America is even faster and riding that a few times has sworn me off of Scramblers for the rest of my life. My wife and the two younger girls loved it.

Blue Streak was not the ride I rode last year. I wasnt all that impressed with it last year, but whatever they did to it over the offseason made this an incredible ride. I rode in 1.3 every single time I rode this(which turned out to be about 10 times) and got a two or three click ride everytime. There was so much wonderful airtime that I was in heaven getting rocketed out of my seat. Catherine loved it so much that she talked Marisa into riding and she loved it so much that we came back and did the ride at night both nights. This ride is absolutely insane at night. It runs much faster and has even better ejector air. I wanna give a quick shout out to Rusty, a ride op for Blue Streak who said he posts here once in a great while, but I dont remember what he said his moniker was here. He noticed my Raging Bull shirt and I talked to him briefly each time I rode.

Next up was Raptor and it was the two older girls that joined me in the half hour wait for this ride. They both love Batman(it was their first coaster believe it or not) and I told them that they would love this if they loved Batman. I wasnt wrong. Both of them agreed that Raptor is WAY better than Batman. Once again, Raptor rules the skys! BTW, the ride ops on this ride totally rock. They had a fun atmosphere and were pumping trains out like there was no tommorow.

Many of our meals these two days were eaten at none other than the Midway Market. Dollar for dollar this is the best value, especially when you are feeding five people. They had awesome desserts and all of their food was above average as far as park food is concerned.

We headed over to Wicked Twister next only to find it was closed. I tried out the test seat and found that I didnt fit anyways so I have resigned myself to never riding an impulse ever until I lose 100 pounds. The girls all got on the Giant Wheel which I didnt do because of my fear of heights.

Next up was Disaster Transport. Most of the thrill of this ride was buying the 3D glasses and checking out the 3D art along the way to the ride. We waited 45 minutes too long for the ride and all of the girls agreed that the ride overall sucked.

It was becoming obvious that we werent going to finish the entire park in one day so we hit some of the rides that we really liked up until closing time. We did manage to hit Gemini though and the two older girls and I took several laps on this venerable Arrow classic. We all agreed that the ending helix was way too rough. We also all agreed that the ride itself was kind of boring but riding in seperate trains and doing the hand slapping thing made this an awesome ride. I often refer to this as the "giggle" factor of a ride. Gemini has tons of "giggle" factor but isnt the most intense ride. The "giggle" is what makes it great.

I tried to get one more lap in on Maggie before leaving but as I got in line with Catherine my wife radios that the other girls are freezing and that she wants to go. So we head back out of line and run into three buzzers! KicksTheSky, Robodud, and vacoasterfreak were getting in line for a late night spin on Maggie. These are the first true buzzers I have met. And yes, KicksTheSky, I did steal your name, but I did it unknowingly. Do I get some kind of leniancy for that? :)

Day two dawned with three girls too tired to move and thusly it was another late start. We got to the park at 11:30 and parked in Soak City again. Again I forgot about the darned wheelchair. Well, luck would have it that Joe Cool had one left and we were good to go. So off we went hitting Gemini, all conciously skipping Mean Streak, and then off to Cedar Creek Mine Ride. I took a pass on this one this time and let the three girls and my wife take a spin. My wife loves this ride because it has no drops. The youngest girl chickened out and met me at the exit because she claimed she saw a big drop on the ride. The other two girls were not impressed.

Next up was my Millenium Force ride. The girls all opted out so I was on my own. After an hour and a half I was on and in the second row. I had an incredible ride, much better than I remembered from the first time. The sheer size and speed of the ride make up for the lack of airtime. I did get a few pops of floater air but it was still a great ride. The first drop is nothing short of a religious experience.

We ended up skipping Mantis and Wildcat for some reason that I am still trying to figure out although I did ride both of them last year. I liked Mantis and I wish I would have gotten a spin this year. The girls and my wife power rode Iron Dragon for a while and then we did the Cadillac Cars, power rode Blue Streak and when 10pm rolled around, we made our way over for the laser show. Awesome show if you have never caught it. Most of the time I would be off riding something else than staying for a show, but this was worth watching. One last ride on Maggie at night capped off a full day. The crew there was on fire that night. They were extremely pumped having the whole station going absolutely insane.

The next day we made our way back west and we stopped at a hotel in Kenosha, WI for the last day of our trip Six Flags Great America, to be covered in my next trip report.

Overall observations? Cedar Point is the cleanest park I have ever been too, but how can a park be dirty if there are garbage cans every ten feet. Why did they remove the hand sanitizer in front of the bathrooms? I thought that was pretty cool. Ride operations at this park are amazing. Why every park feels they need to go with a recorded ride safety speil is beyond me. The crews on these rides add so much life to the rides. I was upset to see the recorded spiel for Blue Streak. My one complaint is the number of foriegn workers at this park. Very few of them had enough command of the English language to do their job properly. Most were assigned to shops and food stands where customer interaction is critical. A few were ride ops for some of the flat rides and were impossible to understand. Otherwise, this is the park to beat. In my book there is no better park than Cedar Point. They may not have the best coasters on the planet, but they do have the best customer service, cleanest park, and most efficient ride operations anywhere.

----------------- Bob Hansen

A proud CoasterBuzz Member

"So you think your'e really brave, gonna see the DEMONS cave. You silly dude, your'e only food, for the DEMON"

PointMan

Monday, July 29, 2002 2:54 PM

Two days and you didn't watch any shows. That's too bad, CP has some really excellent shows. Snoopy on Ice is one of the best amusement park shows I've seen. I like it better than the magic show that PKI had last year(which was also excellent).